Yanni

Yanni presented an assortment of songs from the 20 years or so of his career preceding this 2005 concert, filmed at the Mandalay Resort & Casino in Las Vegas (and also recorded for a CD). As an event, it fulfills all the grand expectations you'd bring to viewing the visual record of a Yanni show (or, for that matter, a Las Vegas extravaganza). The composer gleefully holds court in the middle of a large stage of musicians from the globe, both playing his keyboards and flamboyantly conducting his supporting cast, who play and gesture with only slightly less ebullience than their leader. The performance is embellished with plenty of flashy effects, including laser lights, background graphics, and video screens. The camera work is about as smoothly sophisticated as it gets for live music performance videos, utilizing 16 high-definition cameras for constantly shifting angles, pans, and zooms. The fidelity, likewise, is on the high end for these sort of products, recorded on 125 channels of digital audio (which can be experienced in Surround Sound, if you have that option). The non-converted may well find the glitzy drama of the presentation off-putting, but the committed Yanni fan expects nothing less than all these bells and whistles, and on that count this DVD delivers. Also on the DVD is a 20-minute bonus feature in which Yanni discusses the other musicians, some of the songs, and other elements of his composing and performance, including some rehearsal footage as well. ~ Richie Unterberger, All Music Guide